Focus on feedback
Twardowski asks each of his employees to respond to an
opinion survey at least once every year. He says that the effort
to get employees to respond and respond honestly is a challenge, but the time-consuming process is essential to building
a culture of trust.
“Without a level of trust, you get two responders,” Twardowski
says. “You get a responder who is extremely happy and that’s all
they write and everything is positive. Or you get an employee
responding who is extremely irritated. … If and when you create
that culture of trust, you find the middle territory and that’s
where you truly find your great suggestions, recommendations
and opinions being expressed by employees.”
Like anyone, Twardowski says he loves to hear about all the
things he and the company are doing well. But it’s the honest,
well-reasoned opinions and suggestions that he finds to be
most valuable.
“That’s where I spend most of my time,” Twardowski says.
“There’s some disconnect with the values or the business principles, and they need to be addressed. If an employee is
responding to an opinion survey that way, you know there
have to be others. That’s where my letter writing and telephone calls and personal visits go, in response to that middle
and lower half.”
Twardowski says his goal is always to encourage flow of
communication from the lowest level of employee right to the
president’s office, and the survey is one way of doing that.
“When we invert the organizational chart, our lowest level
employee is at the top and then it filters down all the way to me,”
Twardowski says. “If I’m properly supporting my senior team, they
are supporting the regional team, the regional team is supporting
the branch team and the branch team is supporting the top line,
which is our population of security officers.”
And by focusing on the negative or lukewarm responses to
his employee surveys, Twardowski reinforces the idea that he is not afraid of conflict.
“What you see in society is an awful lot
of people who are afraid of conflict,”
Twardowski says. “That’s OK to be afraid
of conflict outside of an organization.
Inside an organization, if you are afraid
of conflict and you have employees who
are afraid of conflict because it’s not a
trusting environment, it’s problematic
and can stifle an organization.”
